


Moats

by Saki101



Series: Other Experiments [47]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Case Fic, Castles, Childhood Memories, Established Relationship, Fairy Tale Elements, Fluff, M/M, Not Season/Series 03 Compliant, Post-Reichenbach, Roleplay, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-18
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-19 21:13:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1484188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saki101/pseuds/Saki101
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At some point after Sherlock's  return, a fairly straightforward stolen property case yields information about Sherlock's childhood and John's imagination.  Another file gets saved to John's <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/901840">flashdrive</a>.</p><p>Excerpt:  "Old moats are full of surprises," Sherlock said.  There was a gleam in his eye; the corner of a lip turning up.</p><p>It always put them at risk, Sherlock's glee at the prospect of a surprise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moats

**Author's Note:**

> A small stand-alone case fic, which may also be read as part of the [Other Experiments Series](http://archiveofourown.org/series/15644); it would fit in after [Leaf Fall](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1066158).
> 
> Photo credits may be found [here](http://saki101.tumblr.com/post/83104732970/englishcountrycottage-hever-castle) and [here](http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/history-architecture/architectural-tour/index.html).

John eyed the contents of the case Sherlock was unpacking: goggles, torch, hoses, air tanks...

"Now? We haven't gone inside yet." John peered around the topiary at the blank windows overhung by ivy. "Do they even know we're here?"

Sherlock shed his coat, dropped his jacket on the grass, stepped out of his shoes, undid his cuffs.

John's eyes darted across the lawn and back to Sherlock. The shirt billowed as it fell. John glanced across the water to the sunlit windows. "You did tell them you'd accepted their case?"

Sherlock took his phone from his pocket, tossed it at John and let his trousers fall. "Text them," Sherlock said. He pulled a wetsuit from the suitcase. 

John hit reply, his eyes flickering between the tiny keys and the fair skin disappearing beneath black rubber. "What am I writing?" John asked.

"You might suggest tea," Sherlock replied, "I'm likely to be chilled when I'm done." He hoisted an air tank, pausing with it a half metre off the ground as though estimating how full it was. 

John's stomach clenched and his eyes narrowed at the murky water. It would be hard to find Sherlock if he had to dive in after him, if he didn't come up in time. How much time was 'in time'? "How much air in that?" 

"Enough for what I'm looking for," Sherlock said and adjusted the strap of his goggles.

 _Leaving me in the dark again._ John clutched the phone, set his jaw.

The sweep of Sherlock’s glance took in the shift of John’s shoulders, the whitened knuckles. "About 75 minutes. It's not full, but the moat should be shallow, so the air will last longer."

John's fingers loosened slightly. "Should be?"

"Old moats are full of surprises," Sherlock said. There was a gleam in his eye; the corner of a lip turning up.

It always put them at risk, Sherlock's glee at the prospect of a surprise. 

"Geological and otherwise." Sherlock nodded at the mobile. "Tell them we'll call late morning. If someone wanders past before I'm done, deter them with your Captain Watson voice." He winked and then he was gone; slipping beneath the surface with barely a ripple.

John glared at the water. A wink and a disappearance. _Oh, god._

*** 

The cheque was signed with a flourish. Mr Griffin, the manager of the estate, turned towards Sherlock and John, papers in hand. “We are _so_ thankful,” Mr Griffin said in hushed tones, as if a throng of potential eavesdroppers milled nearby. “We never imagined you could solve it this rapidly...even before opening time.” He gave his head a little shake. “And so thoroughly.” He waved towards the two watertight trunks open a few steps away, silver and gold glimmering through half-removed bubble wrap in the larger one; gems catching the sunlight on the velvet tiers of the other. 

Sherlock sniffed and looked at the musicians’ gallery above the doors to the empty hall. He took a step to the side and left a wet footprint on the stone floor.

Mr Griffin drew a quick breath. “Of course, your reputation preceded you,” he added hastily, “but what seemed like hyperbole doesn’t begin to do you justice. Not at all.” Sherlock’s attention remained fixed on a point above Mr Griffin’s head, but John saw the slight tilt in the angle of Sherlock’s neck at the words. The manager didn’t and turned to John. “Items that were written off years ago or never reported at all have been recovered. The director has authorised a finder’s fee be added to the fee we agreed.” He flicked a glance at Sherlock before he held two pieces of paper out towards John. “I hope these express our gratitude and our appreciation of your discretion. We would be honoured to host you and your guests at any time.”

John read the amount on the cheque and succeeded in keeping his eyebrows in place. Behind it was a voucher for free accommodation in perpetuity, with a day’s advance booking preferred. He smiled at the caveat, nodded at the manager and checked where Sherlock had wandered off to. He was at least still in the hall, a darker silhouette against the walnut panelling beneath the gallery. John wondered what else Sherlock was finding. John gestured in Sherlock’s direction. “Our schedule tends to be rather hectic, but I’m sure we’d enjoy coming back to have a more leisurely look around the estate. Right now though, a place for Mr Holmes to shower and change would be most welcome.”

The manager let out a deep breath and extended an arm towards the doors. “Of course, Dr Watson. This way.”

*** 

Sherlock began buttoning his shirt. “He didn’t offer a pick of the jewels?” he asked John with a smile.

John had pushed one of the boudoir chairs closer to the canopied bed, slipped off his shoes and put his feet up on the embroidered coverlet. “Just a bonus and free accommodation forever,” he replied, looking up from his laptop to watch the progress of Sherlock’s fingers. He resisted the temptation to undo it.

“Unimaginative,” Sherlock replied. “What day’s today?” He fastened his left cuff.

“Monday,” John replied, eyes on the long hands. He moistened his lips.

“Book us in for Wednesday then,” Sherlock replied, moving to the foot of the bed and the case that sat on the leather-tufted bench there. 

John’s head turned. “Really? You want to come back here?” John hit a couple keys, detached the flashdrive and closed his hand around it. 

Sherlock flipped open his case, bent down to reach in. 

John hoped Sherlock hadn’t heard the little thunk the computer made. Once more, John's eyes lit upon the key features of the room. The bed was high, ideal for certain positions. He’d pictured a couple in some detail while Sherlock was in the shower. The leather bench held promise...and the window seat...and the sturdy posts of the bed.

“What do you think?” Sherlock replied, holding up a discoloured skull on his outstretched palm.

John looked back at Sherlock, tried to clear his mind as he sat up. He studied the skull a moment. “Upper jaw broken, three teeth missing, impact fracture to the temporal bone strong enough that fragments of it broke off altogether. Death would have been instantaneous.”

“Mm,” Sherlock replied, handing the skull to John. “How old do you think?” Sherlock put on his jacket, shot his cuffs.

“No dental work,” John murmured, turning the skull. “Healed fracture of the zygoma. Fairly young adult male, I’d say.”

“A visit to Bart’s first and then the Natural History Museum,” Sherlock said, taking the skull back and nestling it in the case. “Let’s see just how old he is.” 

***

****

John followed Sherlock and the equally long-legged palaeontologist he had just met. They all avoided colliding with the tourists ambling along the corridor and mounted the staircase to the next floor of the museum, Sherlock’s coat and the scientist’s long, white hair trailing behind them. John caught up as Dr Moynihan unlocked one of a row of identical doors. 

“Have a seat,” he said, moving quickly to the glass-covered shelves behind his desk. “Just put the papers on the floor.”

John picked the chair with the shortest stack of journals, carefully pushed them beneath the seat and sat. He was familiar with this approach to filing, suspected a similar order in the chaos.

“There, there you see,” Moynihan said, holding up a lower jaw bone he’d taken from a high shelf.

Sherlock held out the skull, hand grasping the occipital. Moynihan fit the lower jaw bone to it. “Amazing,” he murmured.

John scowled. The scientist said it almost the same way John did. “You were just a boy when I showed you that last,” Moynihan added. He bent closer to the skull. “Look at that alignment.” 

John got up to do just that. There were fragments missing along the mandibular notch facing him, but what remained slotted together perfectly. A lower tooth was missing below the row of three gone from the upper jaw and several healed fracture lines were visible radiating out from its socket. “Violent life he led,” John muttered.

“Yes,” Moynihan agreed. “With a violent death to conclude it.” He tapped the hole in the temporal bone. “Which was officially denied, of course, and when the tomb was unsealed sixty years later to substantiate the allegations, the upper portion of the skull had conveniently disappeared.” He looked up and beamed at Sherlock. “Until today.” 

“You can finish that paper now,” Sherlock said, settling on a corner of the desk.

Moynihan’s smile brightened even further. “I could at that,” he said and turned to John. “I tried to convince Sherlock to be a palaeontologist when he was a lad. He was going to be my protégé.” 

“Almost succeeded,” Sherlock said, setting the two pieces of the skull carefully down on the desk. “No distracting relatives to deal with. Just the testimony of old bones.”

"But the chemistry won out,” Moynihan sighed. He rolled out his desk chair and sat, leaned forward in it to run a caressing fingertip over the curve of the skull. “And the chance to apprehend evildoers. You’ve put my lessons to good use.

“I have,” Sherlock said. “And you’ve trained most of the top specialists in your field. You have a whole tribe of protégés.” 

Moynihan looked at John again. “That’s what happens when you live to be as old as I am.” He glanced across the room. “What am I thinking?” He popped out of his chair in a manner belying his years and went to a kettle sitting by a stack of books on a side table. “We need tea,” he declared and knelt down to open a door beneath the table. He held up a half-full bottle of a fine Irish whiskey. “With a drop or two of something in it.” 

“So you knew Sherlock as a boy?” John asked as Moynihan set out three mugs and dropped tea bags in them. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sherlock roll his.

“Tutored him for a while, then let him loose in the libraries and the labs,” Moynihan replied, drawing out a box of sugar cubes from his cupboard. “His grandfather used to bring him round when he was very young. Soon enough he came on his own.” He looked over his shoulder at Sherlock. “Whenever he pleased.” Sherlock grinned. “After he began solving our little mysteries for us, we just gave him keys.” Moynihan dropped three cubes in Sherlock’s cup. “Doctor?” John shook his head. "Not that he ever needed them, but we thought it best to make it at least look like we were in control of the situation." The kettle clicked off; Moynihan began pouring boiling water and whiskey.

“How old was he?” John asked, “when he started solving mysteries.”

“The little ones, straight away,” Moynihan replied, handing John his mug. “You wouldn’t believe the number of things that go missing from museums. Of course, some of them were just mislaid. Sherlock would ask a few questions et voilà, we’d have our specimen or implement back where it belonged.” He handed Sherlock his cup. “No mobile phones or email in those days. Staff had to wait until he’d come by for a lesson to get his help or face ringing his grandfather and asking for the assistance of a child." Moynihan chuckled. "Some did. When Sherlock started ‘popping in’, they began to leave notes for him.” Moynihan took his mug and the whiskey bottle to his chair and sat. “It was all a big scavenger hunt to Sherlock and it saved us thousands in lost equipment, millions in artefacts, not to mention the time and embarrassment.”

“Didn’t anybody accuse him of taking the things in the first place?” John asked. He took a taste of his tea. His eyes widened.

Moynihan leaned back in his chair and grinned. “Oh, there were doubters to be sure, the associate director among them, but stuff going spare had been a problem before Sherlock was born." Moynihan took a sip of his tea and a deep breath. "And then he caught us our first actual thief. _That_ was when Master Sherlock Holmes got the formal freedom of the place, borrowing privileges, too. Signed and sealed certificate and everything.” Moynihan swivelled his chair towards Sherlock. “How old were you then, ten?” 

“Nine,” Sherlock said. “It was the same year I came to live with grandfather.”

John looked back and forth between them, recalled some of the extraordinary volumes that crowded the shelves of Baker Street.

Moynihan nodded. “Arthur was proud and the other museums were envious, so they followed suit. Copy cats, the lot.” 

“All of them?” John asked, stretching his legs out in front of him. His tea was half gone and the glow of the warmed whiskey was radiating through him. 

“All of the major ones,” Moynihan replied, "and most of the smaller ones. There wasn't any announcement; it was a word-of-mouth thing. Don’t tell me none of your cases has ever required a visit ‘after hours’.”

John thought of the National Antiquities Museum. 

Moynihan regarded him. “They have, but Sherlock didn’t tell you and you went with him anyway. I read your blog, Dr Watson.” Moynihan tilted his head towards Sherlock, raised his mug in John’s direction. “You found a good one, Sherlock.”

“Yes, I did,” Sherlock said and lifted his cup to drink through his smile.

*** 

John wondered whether he would fall asleep before the taxi reached the other side of Hyde Park. “I thought you said you began with the Carl Powers’ case.”

“First murder,” Sherlock said.

John pursed his lips. “No wonder you were annoyed at the police for ignoring you about that. You’d been solving missing property cases for years by then.”

An irritated snort escaped Sherlock. “Not surprisingly, the museum staff didn’t tell the police how they were gathering the evidence of the thefts or in a couple instances, catching the thieves in the act.”

“And you only cared about the results,” John said, “and the praise.”

“They were lavish with it and I learned a lot. Any question I cared to pose, I had experts to answer me, at length.”

“No wonder you know everything,” John sighed. “Well, except astronomy. No mysteries at the Greenwich Observatory?”

Sherlock huffed.

“You took the castle case for Moynihan,” John mused aloud, head back on the seat, eyes beginning to close. “I was surprised you agreed to it. I thought it was barely a five.”

“I hadn’t thought about the missing skull in years, but Hever Castle was always a suspect location,” Sherlock answered. “It was too good an opportunity to let pass.”

“Lucky for them,” John said.

“Yes.” 

“Why go back if you’ve sorted it? You think there are others?” John asked.

“Possibly. Moats are full of surprises.”

“You said,” John mumbled.

“I saw your expression when you were looking around the place,” Sherlock continued. “It sparked your imagination.”

John’s eyes flew open, another warmth washing over the heat of the whiskey. He pressed his hand against his trouser pocket; the flashdrive was still there. 

Sherlock chuckled and John turned his head towards the sound in spite of himself.

“Was it the wetsuit?” 

John felt his face turning redder.

Sherlock nodded, gaze fixed on John. “Anything else? Thoughts of chivalry? Knights in armour?”

John couldn’t look away.

“Dungeons? Do you capture me or do I capture you?”

John tried to breathe.

“Sorcerers? Alchemy?” Sherlock’s lips began to curl. “It has a certain appeal.”

A corner of the flashdrive was digging into John’s palm. He tried to concentrate on that rather than the shifting colours of Sherlock’s eyes.

“Wandering minstrels?” Sherlock watched carefully. “Unicorns? Dragons?”

John’s eyes widened further.

Sherlock leaned close, blocking the early evening sun. 

John didn’t notice Sherlock’s arm move, just felt his hand sliding over his chest beneath the jacket. Sherlock sat back with John’s phone, hit a few buttons.

“Mr Griffin? Dr Watson and I have had a change of schedule. Would you have anything free for us this evening?” Sherlock turned towards John as he spoke. “Top of the west tower would be fine. We’ll arrive by eight. A light supper would be excellent. Yes, you’re most welcome.”

Sherlock tapped on the glass partition, redirected the taxi to Victoria before he settled back and looked at John. “Think on which it will be, John,” Sherlock said as his eyes travelled from John’s face down to his shoes and up again. “You can tell me when we get there.”

John’s mind was a blur of options, but he did manage to nod.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

**Author's Note:**

> A sequel may be found [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1878669).


End file.
